Merry Christmas!!!

Family and friends,

Wow, Christmas is already upon us! This is insane! 

My final favorite tradition/memory is short and sweet and it will lead me into what I want to talk about in this email. This memory has to do with practically the whole Christmas season and what ties Christmas together for me. For me, it's simply just the feeling of love from family and friends and even complete strangers! 

   Charity is that special word that always rings in my mind especially during this time of year. Christmas is all about charity! And of course, the center of it; the very core, heart, and sole of the season of giving, lies a humble child of our Heavenly Father, named Jesus Christ. With Christ being the center of Christmas, it makes complete sense why Christmas is called Christmas! I see the name being a mix of English and Spanish. The name 'Christ' taken in English, and 'mas' taken in Spanish. The word 'mas' translates to 'more' in English. So the name 'Christmas' practically means, 'More Christ'! And with charity being the pure love of Christ, Christmas also means more charity. And that is exactly what we see this time of year! The is definitely still good in the world, and a lot of it! After all, these are the creations of our God so why wouldn't there still be good? 

   We learn in Mormon's epistle to Moroni, in chapter 7 of Moroni in the Book of Mormon, verses 45 to 48, a lot about charity. Mormon teaches that charity is the pure love of Christ. He says that charity will never fail and that it is by far the greatest principle, attribute, and characteristic to have. And that is absolutely true! If all we have is charity, then that is enough. Charity will bring us in and through the edges of eternity. Of course no one is ever perfect, and we're not expected to be. But we are expected to become perfect, eventually, just as our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ are. Without charity, we will not be able to do so. I believe it is impossible to attain any limit of charity or express in words any sufficient understanding about how important charity is. I think of this because of the greatest example of all, the greatest example of charity that is and ever will be. That is, the Atonement. The Atonement is the eternal example of an act of charity. The completeness, the kindness, love, humility, and sincerity of this act can't ever be compared with, nor can any other act be able to stand next to it. Through this atonement, we can receive the greatest gift possible, salvation. Jesus Christ, the perfect example and mediator, voluntarily goes to Gethsemane and takes upon Him every single affliction, sin, pain, and hurt of the world. Christ was perfect and lived the only sinless life. He didn't have to do this, He was perfect. He could have walked away to enter into the presence of the Father forever. But instead, He laid down His life willingly. In His own words, no greater love does man have than this. To lay down his life for his friends. 

It is my testimony that charity can carry us from the depths of depression or anger, and lift us to eternal happiness. Never forget this important doctrine, that charity is the greatest of all and it will never fail!  Here I will leave you with a quick testimony in Spanish, maybe haha. My grammar is still further than just off but you'll get the idea.  

Yo tengo un fuerte testimonio sobre la expiación de nuestro salvador. Y también yo tengo un testimonio lo que la expiacion puede hacer por nosotros. Yo he visto que eso puede hacer. También, sin la iglesia en mi vida, no puedo progreso y llegar a ser la persona que Padre Celestial me quiere ser. Yo he visto el evangelio tocar los corazones de nuestros investigadores en un camino que no puedo explicar. Aunque no tengo mucho experiencia con español, yo se el espíritu tiene experiencia con todas idiomas en el todo mundo. Y el espíritu tiene un diferente idioma también. Pero, esta idioma es la idioma del espiritu y solo el espíritu habla este idioma. Esta es porque el espiritu es el maestro real. Solamente nosotros hablamos las cosas que el espíritu y nuestro Padre Celestial nos quieren a decir. Porque la Trinidad están en armonia perfecto. Y necesitamos estar en armonia con ellos tambien. Yo quiero a decir mas pero este pagina no puede contener todas las cosas yo puedo decir. ¡El Libro de Mormon es real y contiene el evangelio completo! Por favor guardar estas cosas en sus corazones. Y finalmente, yo testifico que Jesucristo y Dios nos aman.  En el nombre sagrado del Salvador, Jesucristo, amén.

New Area!!!

Family and friends, 

It's been a crazy week and I love it!

First, favorite tradition/memory of the holidays!   Another favorite tradition of mine that we would do was on Christmas Eve. Before going to bed and after doing the Nativity, we would all gather around our family room to open up our first gifts! We would each be given one gift and it was always new pajamas for that Christmas! It would be so wonderful to all sit in our spots and wait for our dad to hand out the presents to each of us while many of us were getting very anxious to open the gift as we had to wait until everyone got theirs. But once everyone had theirs, the wrapping paper was all off in seconds. Then we run to go change into our new pajamas and try them on. I'm happy to say that mine fit perfectly every year! Others weren't always so lucky. So they needed to be exchanged for a smaller or bigger size. 

This week was fantastic!! We had changes this week and I am now with a new companion, Elder Mendez, in the area, Pantitlan! It was a pretty intense change because first, it came out of nowhere, I wasn't expecting it at all. Second, this new area is very far away from my older one, Tecamac. My area is the furthest south in the mission. Any farther and I would be in a different mission haha. And Tecamac is pretty far up north so it was over an hour and a half drive. But I'm now in Mexico City and closer to the temple! But here is how my Saturday night went, Elder Gonzales and I were waiting in our apartment for any changes (missionaries have to be home earlier when changes and calls are going on) and it was pretty expected that he was leaving to a new area since he had already been in Tecamac for a while, about 6 months. It seemed I was going to stay there for a while so we had planned around this. We talked about investigators and less active that my new companion and I needed to focus on and we had everything figured out. But time passed and eventually it got close to 10pm. If you don't have a call by then, that pretty much means you don't have changes. The whole time I was really nervous to find out if I was going to get a new companion but when it was getting late, we figured that we weren't getting anything new. Elder Gonzales was of course on edge as well and sending messages to our district leader to see what was going on. But nothing. I hadn't changed yet so I was still in my shirt and tie, I was just too nervous haha. But when it got closer to 10, we figured nothing was going to happen. So just as I began to go change, the phone rang in the other room! Elder Gonzales sat up in his bed quicker than ever and we both looked at each other. I motioned for him to answer it so we both go into the room and Elder Gonzales says the usual when answering. Our zone leaders ask how it's going and say they have the changes to deliver. So we break out our notepads to write the new info (new companion and new area if you have it). Both of us were thinking it was only for Elder Gonzales. He gets his change first and our zone leader says, Elder Gonzales, "The Lord has called you to be a district leader in a new area."  But I forget the name of his new area. But I'm of course congratulating him and we were about ready to say goodbye to our zone leaders, but then, he says, "Elder Markham, I have your changes now". Then I'm like, oh. He says, "Elder Markham, the Lord has called you to a new area. The new area you will be serving in is Pantitlan." He then gives all the info we need and we say goodbye. But yeah, I wasn't expecting that. But now I'm here and I love the area. It was hard to say goodbye to all the members in Tecamac but I do also love this new area. It's pretty small actually so I'm no longer on bikes! I'll send more about the new area next week! Take care everyone!

-Elder Markham

Love The Work!

Family and friends, 

To start off this email, here's the next of my favorite tradition/memory! 

Last week, I mentioned how the Christmas Eve nights go. Now I want to say how they start! As I'm sure many families do, my family has always acted out the Christmas Nativity. Which is one of my all-time favorite stories. That was always something special and a good reminder of what Christmas is really about. My parents have always done a great job of implementing this reminder into Christmas. After dinner, it was always a quick clean up and get ready for the Nativity! The excitement and rushing around to find clothes with everyone for the Nativity was always a thrill! The usual throw a towel on our heads and get a robe to wear has been the go-to. And when my Mom would narrate using the scriptures, that always gave a certain Christmas feel that nothing else could give. The Nativity will always be one of the greatest stories ever, and for good reason. I love it so much! 

  This week was fantastic!!! We had interviews and later that day, I went on divisions again with the other American Elder in my district of four (to my area, yes!). I have a small miracle that goes along with it. So after the interviews, the Elder and I stopped at a small shop for lunch before returning home after getting off a smaller bus, or as the natives call it, a 'combi.' We were sitting down for lunch and just before we were finished, I received a call from our zone leaders about how we needed to get some baptism records of new converts to our mission president back at the chapel we had just returned from. It was about 40 minutes away. So we had to rush back to the apartment, grab the papers, and rush back. The thing was, him and I have the same time out here in the field so neither of our Spanish is exactly up to par. All we had to do was hope we get to the right place. We knew what the area was called that we needed to get to so we were able to find a combi to take us to the right area. Except this particular combi we got was a Mexibus, so it goes to this station to drop people off. And that's where it took us, not where we needed to go. Earlier on the ride I had asked the driver how far Ojo de Agua (the area we needed to get to) was. He said like 20 more minutes. But he just took us to the station. When we got there, he told us there was another combi going where we needed to go so we got on that one. Still, the problem was, we knew what area to get to but didn't know how to get to the chapel once we got to the area. But oh well, we needed to get the papers there no matter what and we figured the Lord would help us get them there. And He did! Once we got on the bus and started talking to the driver, we found out he was actually a member! So he just took us right to the chapel. That was a nice blessing we received! The rest of the day was awesome! We picked up two future investigators who later became new investigators and got three extensions for attending sacrament meeting, and they did attend! It was just a good day overall. Lessons were great and full of the spirit. Everything all done in a little over four hours since we didn't get back until about 5pm from turning the papers in!

Tomorrow we have our Christmas zone conference and that will be a blast! During our interviews, we also found out that we are having changes early because of the big black out going on during the holidays where the church doesn't send out missionaries because of how expensive it is and how many people there are traveling. So President Parry is doing changes to get some missionaries home before Christmas, the ones that are close to leaving anyway. I guess we weren't supposed to know yet though because Sister Parry told a few of us missionaries while we were waiting for our interviews then when President Parry came out of one of his interviews, some of us started asking questions and he was like, "You guys weren't supposed to know that yet haha." But he didn't really mind so it was okay. Anyway, now we have two new baptism dates for this month and still holding on to the one we have for the first Saturday of next year!  

Quick update about the Valasces family I had received revelation about from almost two months ago!  The mother is now starting to go back to church, the daughter is the one who has a baptism date for January, and just last night the father just started taking lessons out of nowhere! It's truly amazing to see the gospel and atonement work in the lives of the people we love!

Sorry I can't send pictures until I get a new cord. My other one was stolen. And the other one in our apartment isn't all that great and can't connect. 

But I look forward to next week's emailing!! Talk to you all soon!

-Elder Markham

Pictures from his Mission

A small sandstorm off in the distance! A small tornado that we saw when going down the highway! It didn't do a lot of destruction so that's good. It was just funny to see some random  things flying around. It was moving pretty fast but we only watched for like 30 seconds haha.  Me wearing Banks colors cause I heard they made it to yet another championship!  Then me just out enjoying the mission. 

At the temple with Arnulfo and Elvia. Some of the newest members to the Church! 

Charity

Family and friends, 

What a wonderful week it's been! Sorry I didn't get an email out last week. Because of that, I will share TWO more favorite holiday traditions/memories! 

First- Like I'm sure many families do, we always do Secret Santas every year for Christmas! One of my most favorite things we would do is just a week or so before Christmas, our family would all pile into our massive van and go to the Washington square mall to pick out our gifts for who we had for Secret Santas. Listening to Christmas music on the way over at 6:00 pm ( already dark outside with it being winter ) and enjoying the feeling of Christmas was always really special. My mom always needed to know who had who so she could pair the right people up to go shopping. Then it was always really awkward running into a pair or two when we were in the same stores...  The Washington square mall is quite large so it usually takes a while to get everyone back together. We always made a plan, looking at the map, to meet somewhere at a certain time but that never works out perfectly haha. Then after a while of shopping, we all go to the upper floor at the food court to get food and pick out from a variety of restaurants. Then afterwards we just hang out and check out more of the different stores and Christmas decorations. 

Second- Christmas Eve had always been something to really look forward to! One tradition we did had to do with all my brothers and sisters. When we lived in Banks, we had a bonus room that my brothers and sisters and I would always stay in on Christmas Eve. That was always so fun because some of us literally didn't sleep and just stayed up talking or watching movies and enjoying the wonderful smell of the Christmas breakfast that my parents were preparing for the following morning. It was the time spent with my siblings that meant the most, and at the time, being one of the youngest, it was always comforting and enjoyable to have all my older brothers and sisters there. ( Really quick note-- Having many brothers and sisters, especially older ones, has been something I really enjoy and appreciate because I realize that there are many who don't have this blessing). And being a kid, it was so exciting for me to see the floor and beds covered with our pillows and blankets, knowing that this was going to be the best Christmas ever, each year. Of course we set alarms in case we all fell asleep, some of us did on occasion but that's okay. But at around 5 to 6 am, we would all rush into our parents' room to wake them up and get ready to go open the presents! 

The end of the year is the best time of year!

So this week was so great! The next baptism we have coming up is for Maria! It will be a week from this Saturday. I'm sorry I couldn't send pictures of Elvia's baptism from last week! It's such a wonderful blessing to see these investigators get so excited for their baptism. Especially this time of year when it's full of love and charity! This last Sunday being fast Sunday was great! We, again, had pancakes for the sacrament. I really hope this is some sort of tradition or something haha. But the week before, I gave a talk in sacrament meeting so that was fun! It went great! My trainer said that my grammar was about 90 percent correct so I guess I'm improving haha. The language is still of course difficult, but I get better with it each week through the blessings. I'm not by any means advanced with the language, but I'm not falling behind either. So I'm quite comfortable where I'm at. Lessons are great and full of the spirit! It's really interesting to see and feel how comfortable we get with teaching the people when we come to a better understanding about how the spirit works through the missionaries. Being missionaries, we are entitled to the special guidance of what to say and when to say it. The Holy Ghost is the real teacher! And the language of the Spirit is far stronger than Spanish or English so as long as us missionaries strive to have the spirit with us as we work and teach, everything will work out according to God's plan. It's simply about forgetting and letting go of 'how many numbers we want' and focus more on the salvation of others. Heavenly Father has a plan for each person, including us, and He put us in this mission and knows who many people we will baptize and confirm. So we are better able to accomplish this plan when we focus on the guidance of the Holy Ghost and acquire a greater desire for the salvation of the people in our mission. This is charity! The pure love of Christ! I enjoy this characteristic very much and I greatly respect and admire those who have this characteristic. My challenge to all of you this Christmas season is to find ways to express your charity for others! It will bring a peace to your heart that will make you want to continue sharing your charity with others! 

I will try to share some pics but it seems like some of them are hard to get through so I will send as many as I can!  

-Elder Markham

Pics- Us at the temple for the Christmas lights! Also us with the stake patriarch, who is in our ward, at his home! He loves Christmas just as much as me! But he is also such a sweet man, and him and his wife now always have Christmas programs and music going on when they invite us over for meals and Sunday nights!

Blake's tan line from his CTR (Choose the Right) Ring